Sample PDF Talk The Talk

TALK THE TALK
A Dialogue Workshop
for Scriptwriters
PENNY PENNISTON
M I C H A E L W I E S E P R O D U C T I O N S
CONTENTS
Acknowledgments x
Introduction xi
Why You Need This Book xi
How to Use This Book xii
The Voice: How People Talk 1
Lesson One: Capturing the Voice 3

Lesson 1: Script Analysis Exercise 5
Lesson 1: Beginner Exercise 6
Lesson 1: Intermediate and Advanced Exercise 8
Lesson 1: Solo Exercise 11
Lesson Two: Imitating a Voice 13

Lesson Three: Creating an Original Voice 21

v
TA L K T H E TA L K ! P E N N I S T O N
Dialogue: How People Talk to Each Other 31
Lesson Four: Status 33

Lesson Five: Give and Take 41

Lesson Six: Building Dialogue 51

Lesson Seven: Dialogue on Shifting Sands 61

Lesson Eight: Strengths and Weaknesses 71

V I
C O N T E N T S
Lesson Nine: Friends and Foes 79

Lesson Ten: Tools 87

The Scene: Dialogue with Direction 97
Lesson Eleven: Setting the Scene 99

Lesson Twelve: Populating the Scene 109

Lesson 12: Exercise Introduction 110
Lesson Thirteen: Crafting the Line 123

V I I
Lesson Fourteen: From Line to Line 133

Lesson Fifteen: Focusing the Scene 143

Lesson Sixteen: Keeping Everyone in the Scene 157

Lesson Seventeen: Maneuvering Through
the Scene 175
Lesson Eighteen: Ending the Scene 183

V I I I
C O N T E N T S
Lesson Nineteen: Rewriting the Scene 191

Lesson 19: Rewrite Exercise: In the Audience’s Shoes 191
Lesson 19: Rewrite Exercise: Voices 192
Lesson 19: Rewrite Exercise: Interactions 193
Lesson 19: Rewrite Exercise: The World 194
Lesson 19: Rewrite Exercise: Forces at Work 195
Lesson 19: Rewrite Exercise: Turning Points 196
Lesson 19: Rewrite Exercise: The Ending 197
Lesson Twenty: Scene to Script 199

Put This Book Down 215

Conclusion 217
Appendix 219
Script Analysis Suggestions 221
Course and Workshop Syllabus Suggestions 224
For Further Reading 236
About the Author 238
I X
THE VOICE:
HOW PEOPLE TALK
HAMLET: Speak the speech, I pray you, as I
pronounced it to you, trippingly on the tongue.
—William Shakespeare (Hamlet)
LESSON ONE:
Capturing the Voice
Hamlet
A
s a scriptwriter, one of the first things you need to
master is the ability to capture dialogue on the page.
This is trickier than it sounds. Schools spend years
drilling us in prose writing — writing that is meant to be
read. Dialogue isn’t meant to be read; it is meant to be
heard. The scriptwriter has the difficult task of taking
something that is meant to be heard, putting it on the
page in such a way that it can be read, but ultimately
making sure that once it comes off the page and into an
actor’s mouth, it will still sound like speech.
Scriptwriters do this by abandoning almost every-
thing we ever learned about composition, grammar, and
3
punctuation. In dialogue, people rarely pre-organize

their thoughts. They don’t necessarily use complete
sentences or speak with proper grammar. People do
not talk in prose. And because people do not talk in
prose, scriptwriters do not write dialogue in prose. We
do not stay bound to the traditional rules of composi-
tion. We reappropriate grammar. We create vocabulary.
We employ rogue punctuation marks such as the ellip-
sis and the em dash. Your fourth grade teacher would
be horrified, but your actors and your audience will
thank you for it.
A few tips on dialogue punctuation:
s An ellipsis (...) suggests that a character’s thought
trails off.
s An em dash ( — ) suggests that a character stops a
thought short, interrupts himself, or is interrupted
by someone else.
s Periods create a pause or complete a thought. They
work sort of like the word “stop” in a telegram.
Forget what you learned in school. In dialogue,
you don’t need a complete sentence in order to
use the period.
Here’s an example:
!"#$
%&'(#)*+,'(-+./.01(,+)1(
*)/2(3(1+.01(4&,(,+.(,56.(7(
4
C A P T U R I N G T H E V O I C E
8189225(*&(&8,(:),+'(7(818;
9225(*&(&8,(:),+(1&<.&4.=(
1>)44)./'(!&/.(?),@(5&8(
>4&:A(B8,(,+)1(*)/2(3(1+.01(
?9,'(7(<.94(C"-'("4D(,+.(
,+)4*()1@(7(,+)4>(),01(+&,'(
E.9+'(%<&>)40'
LESSON 1: SCRIPT ANALYSIS EXERCISE "

NOTE: In this exercise, beginning and intermediate
writers should analyze published work by established
writers. See the Appendix for a list of suggestions.
Advanced writers have the option of bringing in their
own work for analysis.
Have each member of the group bring in one page
of dialogue from a play or screenplay. It’s helpful to
include a broad range of authors, genres, and writing
styles.
For Discussion:
Review each page of dialogue with the group.

1. Describe the speaking style of each character.
2. How did the phrasing and punctuation of the
dialogue contribute to your sense of each char-
acter’s voice?
3. How does the style and rhythm of the dialogue
contribute to the overall tone of the scene?
5
Is this a comic scene? A romantic scene? A

melodramatic scene? What in the rhythm of the
dialogue contributes to this impression?
4. Do you notice a difference in the style of dia-
logue from author to author? Compare and
contrast your impressions.
! LESSON 1: BEGINNER EXERCISE
For this exercise, you will need a portable audio

recorder. Interview two to three different people and
ask them the same question. The question should be
open-ended: one that can’t be answered with a simple
yes or no. (See below for a list of examples.) When
selecting your interview subjects, try to find people as
different from each other as possible: different ages,
genders, socioeconomic backgrounds, nationalities,
etc. It doesn’t matter if your subjects know or remem-
ber all the details that the question asks — the point is
to get them talking and to get them to answer the ques-
tion as fully as possible in their own voice. Try to speak
as little as possible while they answer.
Record each interview with an audio recorder. Then
type up the interview word for word. As you type, try
to capture the rhythm of the subject’s speech in your
punctuation.
Some suggestions for interview questions:
!" What is your earliest memory?
6
!" Describe the job of president of the United

States.
!" Tell me what happened in the most recent
episode of your favorite television show.
!" How did God create the world?
!" Describe a dream that you had recently.
For Discussion:
1. Look over your transcriptions. Does anything

surprise you? How does the transcription of the
dialogue differ from traditional prose?
2. Have someone in the group (preferably someone
with an acting background) read your transcrip-
tion out loud. After the group member has
read the transcription, play the original audio
recording. In what ways did the reader sound
different than the original speaker? Were there
differences in the rhythm of the speech? Were
there differences in emphasis or tone? If so,
was there something in the way that the speech
was transcribed onto the page that caused this
difference?
3. What verbal habits or tics do you notice in the
speaker’s pattern of speech? For example: Is this
a person who uses a particular phrase over and
over? Is this a person who speaks in clipped,
precise sentences? Is this a person who rambles
7
from topic to topic without ever completing a

thought? Is this a person who can never come
up with the word he’s looking for?
4. What tones do you hear in the speaker’s dia-
logue? Has the question provoked an emotional
response such as anger, passion, or enthusiasm?
How does the speaker seem to feel about what
he is saying?
5. Have members of the group try to describe the
speaker based on what they hear in the inter-
view. What do you imagine that this person is
like? Where do you think he lives? Where does
he work? Who are his friends? What does he do
in his free time?
! LESSON 1: INTERMEDIATE AND ADVANCED

EXERCISE
The following three paragraphs are from Life on the Miss-

issippi by Mark Twain. The book is a memoir of his years
working as a steamboat pilot on the Mississippi River. In
this excerpt, Twain reflects on how his growing expertise
of the river eventually killed his romance with it.
Now when I had mastered the language of

this water and had come to know every tri-
fling feature that bordered the great river as
familiarly as I knew the letters of the alpha-
bet, I had made a valuable acquisition. But
8
I had lost something, too. I had lost some-

thing which could never be restored to me
while I lived. All the grace, the beauty, the
poetry had gone out of the majestic river! I
still keep in mind a certain wonderful sunset
which I witnessed when steamboating was
new to me. . . . I stood like one bewitched.
I drank it in, in a speechless rapture. The
world was new to me, and I had never seen
anything like this at home.
But as I have said, a day came when I
began to cease from noting the glories and
the charms which the moon and the sun
and the twilight wrought upon the river’s
face… Then, if that sunset scene had been
repeated, I should have looked upon it with-
out rapture, and should have commented
upon it, inwardly, after this fashion: This
sun means that we are going to have wind
tomorrow; that floating log means that the
river is rising, small thanks to it; that slant-
ing mark on the water refers to a bluff reef
which is going to kill somebody’s steamboat
one of these nights, if it keeps on stretching
out like that…
No, the romance and the beauty were
all gone from the river. All the value any fea-
ture of it had for me now was the amount of
9
usefulness it could furnish toward compass-

ing the safe piloting of a steamboat. Since
those days, I have pitied doctors from my
heart. What does the lovely flush in a beau-
ty’s cheek mean to a doctor but a “break”
that ripples above some deadly disease. Are
not all her visible charms sown thick with
what are to him the signs and symbols of
hidden decay? Does he ever see her beauty
at all, or doesn’t he simply view her profes-
sionally, and comment upon her unwhole-
some condition all to himself? And doesn’t
he sometimes wonder whether he has gained
most or lost most by learning his trade?
The prose is beautifully written. But imagine if Twain

did not have the luxury of sitting down at a typewriter
and carefully composing his thoughts over several drafts.
Imagine instead that Twain told this story out loud, in
the moment, to someone standing in the room with
him. Rewrite this excerpt as that monologue.
For Discussion:
Have someone in the group read the original essay out

loud and then read her monologue version of it.
1. How did the monologue version differ from the
prose version?
2. After all the monologues have been read,
1 0
compare and contrast the choices made by

the monologue authors. In what ways were
all the monologues the same? What were the
differences?
3. Have each writer discuss the process of adapt-
ing the essay. What was the thought process
that went into the choices by the writer? In what
ways did the writer decide to stay faithful to the
original text? In what ways did the writer feel
free to diverge from the original text? How and
why did the writer make those decisions?
4. Were there any aspects of the original piece that
were particularly difficult to capture in mono-
logue form? If so, why?
LESSON 1: SOLO EXERCISE #

Pick an excerpt from any piece of prose (e.g., an essay,
newspaper article, or novel). Rewrite that excerpt as a
monologue. The challenge is to stay as faithful as possi-
ble to the original tone, style, and content of the piece,
but to re-create it as something spoken instead of read.
Now, rewrite that monologue. In the rewrite, keep
the words of the monologue exactly the same, but
change the punctuation. How much can you alter the
tone and meaning of the monologue simply by chang-
ing the punctuation?
As an ongoing workout, experiment with different
1 1
source material. What kinds of prose are easy to adapt

into monologues? What kinds are not? As you get
better at adapting, challenge yourself by picking dif-
ficult selections.
1 2
TOMMY: What do you mean, I’m funny?... You
mean the way I talk? What?... Funny how? I
mean, what’s funny about it?
—Goodfellas (1990)
LESSON TWO:
Imitating a Voice
W
ho are the voices in your head? Who are the
people with speech so familiar to you that you
can hear them talking when you close your eyes?
In your life, who talks so distinctively and with such
clarity of personality that you could imitate his rants,
raves, sputterings, mumblings, or musings on any topic?
Is it your crazy Aunt Tillie? Is it your rambling college
professor? Is it your overly earnest ex-boyfriend?
You don’t have to limit yourself to people you know
personally. Consider the familiar and distinctive speech
patterns of actors such as Jack Nicholson or television
characters such as Tony Soprano or Homer Simpson.
Consider other public figures. I’ve listened to the same
local radio station for the past fifteen years. The patter
of the morning DJ is as familiar to me as my morning
shower.
Often, art students are given the assignment to copy
an existing painting. The act of imitating another piece
of art forces the artist to go beyond her typical choices
13
and expand her repertoire. She must learn to use the

heavy brush strokes of Van Gogh or the tiny meticu-
lous dabs of Seurat. She will experiment with Rothko’s
layers of colors or Picasso’s disjointed perspectives.
Each of these exercises expands her skill set — a skill set
that she can draw on in her future work.
By listening to the voices around us, and then
attempting to imitate them on the page, we writers
get a similar benefit. By tuning in to other people’s
distinctive patterns of speech, we hone our own ear
for dialogue. By recreating those patterns on the page,
we force ourselves to understand the nuances of those
voices and we stretch our dialogue-writing technique
into new territory.
" LESSON 2: SCRIPT ANALYSIS EXERCISE
NOTE: In this exercise, beginning and intermediate

writers should analyze published work by established
writers. See the Appendix for a list of suggestions.
Advanced writers have the option of bringing in their
own work for analysis.
Have the entire group see the same play, watch the
same film, or read the same script. (See the Appendix
for a list of suggestions.)
For Discussion:
1. Describe the speaking style for each character.
1 4
I M I TAT I N G A V O I C E
2. How did those styles differ from each other?

How were they the same?
3. Which characters had the most memorable or
unique voices? What made the voices memo-
rable or unique?
4. Imagine you were writing an original scene for
each character. As a writer, what would you do in
the dialogue to capture each character’s voice?
LESSON 2: BEGINNER EXERCISE !

1. By yourself or with a group, come up with a list
of famous voices. They might be actors, public
figures, or famous characters from television,
stage, or film. Whoever they are, they should
a) be well known; and b) have done an exten-
sive amount of speaking. In other words, it’s not
enough for the person to be famous. He should
also have a famous voice. Here are a few exam-
ples from one of my lists:
!" Kramer (from Seinfeld)
!" Bill O’Reilly
!" Tony Soprano
!" Barack Obama
!" Lisa Simpson (from The Simpsons)
!" Blanche DuBois
2. Each writer draws a name from the list of famous
voices. The assignment is to write a monologue
1 5
in which that character speaks on the following

topic:
Describe your favorite color to some-
one who has been blind since birth.
3. As you write the monologue, you must follow
these rules:
!" The goal is to imitate the voice as accurately
and realistically as possible. Make sure that
you avoid parody.
!" In the monologue, avoid names or references
that could instantly identify the character.
For example, if you are writing a monologue
for Lisa Simpson, it is cheating to include
a line like “That’s what I told my brother,
Bart,” or “Here we are in Springfield.”
For Discussion:
1. Read each monologue aloud to the group. Eval-

uate the personality of the voice. How would
you describe this character? What in the dia-
logue influences your perception?
2. Have the group look at the character list and try
to guess who the speaker is.
3. Survey the people who guessed correctly. What
was it about the monologue that made them
able to identify the character?
1 6
4. Survey the people who guessed incorrectly.

What was it about the monologue that threw
them off and left them unable to identify the
character?
5. Were there any sections of the monologue
where the writer cheated? Did he use any spe-
cific names or references that immediately gave
away the identity of the speaker?
6. Have each writer discuss how he approached the
monologue. What specific vocal patterns did
he notice in the character’s speech and try to
recreate in the monologue? What was the most
challenging aspect of writing the monologue? In
approaching the challenging parts, what did the
writer do to overcome those challenges? What
insights about dialogue writing can be gleaned
from that approach?
LESSON 2: INTERMEDIATE AND ADVANCED !

EXERCISE
1. For this exercise, you will need to select a person

whose voice is unfamiliar to you. This might be
a distant acquaintance or it might be a well-
documented but still obscure public figure.
Whoever it is, the person should be real (not fic-
tional). Immerse yourself in that person’s voice
for a week. If you know the person, interview
17
her in detail and ask her about her life. Spend

as much time as possible with her in different
social settings. If the person is a public figure,
spend a week listening to her speeches, public
interviews, or broadcasts. Read material that will
give you background information on her life
(interviews, biographies, memoirs, etc).
2. After spending the week becoming familiar with
the new subject, write a monologue capturing
that person’s voice. The monologue can be on
any subject you wish, but it must obey the fol-
lowing rules:
!" The monologue must be completely origi-
nal. Do not simply cobble together existing
statements by the subject.
!" The monologue must be set in a particular
time and place and it must be spoken to a
particular person or people. In stage direc-
tions before the monologue, describe where
the subject is when she speaks. Describe
exactly whom she is speaking to.
For Discussion:
Each author should read his monologue out loud to

the group. Do not read the stage directions out loud,
only the monologue.
1 8
1. Upon hearing the monologue, what are the

group’s impressions of the speaker? How would
the group describe her?
2. What verbal habits or tics do you notice in the
speaker?
3. What is the subject of the monologue? What
emotional overtones does it convey?
4. Where and when does the monologue take place?
Who is the subject speaking to? What other con-
text can you glean from the monologue?
5. Why is the speaker saying this monologue?
What motivates her to speak these words?
6. Ask the author: How do the group’s impres-
sions differ (if at all) from your intent? Did the
group miss out on anything that you intended
to convey? Did the group read anything in to
the monologue that surprised you?
7. If there are different interpretations of the
monologue, try to identify the elements of
the monologue that led to those different
interpretations.
After hearing all the monologues out loud, discuss
the following:
1. When your group answered the questions above,
there may have been conflicting opinions over
the interpretation of some monologues. There
1 9
may have been distance between what the author

wrote and what the audience inferred. When is
it acceptable for different audience members to
have different interpretations of something that
a character says? When is it acceptable for the
audience to infer something that the author did
not intend? When is it not acceptable?
2. Which monologues gave you the most sense of
context? Which ones gave you the clearest sense
of who the speaker was, where he was located,
whom he was speaking to, why he was speaking,
etc.? What was it about those monologues that
allowed you to make such clear inferences?
# LESSON 2: SOLO EXERCISE
This exercise requires a bit of eavesdropping. When

you are out in public, listen in on a nearby conversa-
tion. Note the location, tone, and subject matter of
the conversation. Zero in on one of the conversation
participants. Focus on that person. Listen for the par-
ticular personality of that person’s voice. Jot down
three quotes from him as he speaks.
Take the three quotes and weave them into an
original monologue that captures the conversation par-
ticipant’s voice. The monologue can be on the same
subject as the overheard conversation, or it can be on a
completely different subject.
2 0

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TALK THE TALK

The Voice: How People Talk 1

Lesson One: Capturing the Voice 3

Lesson Two: Imitating a Voice 13

Lesson Three: Creating an Original Voice 21

Dialogue: How People Talk to Each Other 31

Lesson Four: Status 33

Lesson Five: Give and Take 41

Lesson Six: Building Dialogue 51

Lesson Seven: Dialogue on Shifting Sands 61

Lesson Eight: Strengths and Weaknesses 71

Lesson Nine: Friends and Foes 79

Lesson Ten: Tools 87

The Scene: Dialogue with Direction 97

Lesson Eleven: Setting the Scene 99

Lesson Twelve: Populating the Scene 109

Lesson Thirteen: Crafting the Line 123

Lesson Fourteen: From Line to Line 133

Lesson Fifteen: Focusing the Scene 143

Lesson Sixteen: Keeping Everyone in the Scene 157

Lesson Eighteen: Ending the Scene 183

Lesson Nineteen: Rewriting the Scene 191

Lesson Twenty: Scene to Script 199

Put This Book Down 215

About the Author 238

punctuation. In dialogue, people rarely pre-organize

LESSON 1: SCRIPT ANALYSIS EXERCISE "

Review each page of dialogue with the group.

Is this a comic scene? A romantic scene? A

! LESSON 1: BEGINNER EXERCISE

For this exercise, you will need a portable audio

!" Describe the job of president of the United

1. Look over your transcriptions. Does anything

from topic to topic without ever completing a

! LESSON 1: INTERMEDIATE AND ADVANCED

The following three paragraphs are from Life on the Miss-

Now when I had mastered the language of

I had lost something, too. I had lost some-

usefulness it could furnish toward compass-

The prose is beautifully written. But imagine if Twain

Have someone in the group read the original essay out

compare and contrast the choices made by

LESSON 1: SOLO EXERCISE #

source material. What kinds of prose are easy to adapt

and expand her repertoire. She must learn to use the

" LESSON 2: SCRIPT ANALYSIS EXERCISE

NOTE: In this exercise, beginning and intermediate

1. Describe the speaking style for each character.

2. How did those styles differ from each other?

LESSON 2: BEGINNER EXERCISE !

in which that character speaks on the following

1. Read each monologue aloud to the group. Eval-

4. Survey the people who guessed incorrectly.

LESSON 2: INTERMEDIATE AND ADVANCED !

1. For this exercise, you will need to select a person

her in detail and ask her about her life. Spend

Each author should read his monologue out loud to

1. Upon hearing the monologue, what are the

may have been distance between what the author

# LESSON 2: SOLO EXERCISE

This exercise requires a bit of eavesdropping. When

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